hi guys
in sport climbing the Quickdraws have a carabiner holder of rubber or tape or stiff stitching
this in theory makes cross loading difficult and orientates the carabiner for easy clipping

for trad where extending a placement mainly to stop cam walk or a nut being pulled out
would you suggest using the quick draw in stiff sport mode or removing the "keeper" so that it is free to move ?
thanks
/d

Ps: I have longer alpine draws but I'm specifically referring to pre made quickdraws

I disagree: I can't see that not having a rubber sleeve is any safer and it just means more faff with inverted biners.
For slings there is a safety risk in using a rubber sleeve, google has some nice videos showing why.
I'd be wary of using sport draws for trad. Bolts cause small aluminum burrs on the inside of the biner which can damage the tape on cams.

Quickdraws should be left as quickdraws - as is. The rubber keeper helps orientate the carabiner correctly, particularly if lifted to the side.

As Hector says the issues with rubber keepers can be exacerbated by longer slings but in essence there is nothing wrong with rubber keepers on long slings, even when used as Alpine Draws - the issue is with how people use the rubber keepers. This is not exclusive to long slings equipped with rubber keepers - Tito Traversi was using normal quickdraws where the rubber keepers were incorrectly fitted. So it goes back to - know what you are doing and how you are doing it! I doubt you run any risk of killing yourself if you use proper rubber holders like the ones from Petzl (called the String) or something similar. Using elastic bands or O rings is a little more open to risk - unless once again you know what you are doing.

Even more cool are the new long draws you can get - like the ones from metolius I think - with tiny biners and an extra long dogbone - not quite as versatile as a sling but every bit up to the task in most trad situations!

Old Smelly wrote:As Hector says the issues with rubber keepers can be exacerbated by longer slings but in essence there is nothing wrong with rubber keepers on long slings, even when used as Alpine Draws - the issue is with how people use the rubber keepers. This is not exclusive to long slings equipped with rubber keepers - Tito Traversi was using normal quickdraws where the rubber keepers were incorrectly fitted. So it goes back to - know what you are doing and how you are doing it! I doubt you run any risk of killing yourself if you use proper rubber holders like the ones from Petzl (called the String) or something similar. Using elastic bands or O rings is a little more open to risk - unless once again you know what you are doing.

Ha, I get to disagree with you here. Everything is right with the world again.

If you use keepers (no matter how "proper") and make alpine draws you run the risk of ending up with the biner clipped AROUND and not THROUGH the sling (and this not being obvious), just by jiggling around in your bag on the way to the crag. It means that you HAVE to very carefully check each one every time you take it out your bag. Is this a risk that you want? Ages ago Phlip almost found this out on a route. It's somewhere in the forum history.

We should rather look at the converse of this argument. What do rubber keepers ADD to trad draws? Nothing really. Having a "kept" biner certainly keeps the orientation of the biner better for slightly easier clipping, but that's it. It's no safer as the gear end of the biner and the sling end are interchangeable with no loss of strength. In fact it might be better to not have keepers as it allows you to rotate the biner without unclipping from the gear should the gate be in a non-ideal orientation.

Now to the loose biners being better - lets look at what happens when you place a piece of pro and clip it to the rope. For the purposes of this excercise lets have the sling over your shoulder, 2 carabiners dangling down. Place pro, lift sling over shoulder, clip a biner to the pro, sling dangles, clip loose biner to the rope.

Aaah but wait - first you have to catch the biner and it's a wiley little character - so you end up messing around hunting him with your loose hand. Once caught you need to fiddle a clip in (that would have been easier with a keeper - maybe 100x). Anyway it's clipped and you climb away, but when you look down you see the biner has rotated into a terrible position and ls lying crossloaded on the gate on an edge. Sure - if you fall everything will move, but chances are that the biner has almost 90% more chance of ending up in a terrible orientation when you need it most.

Sorry - not worth the risk. Rather just know what you are doing and use the rubber keepers. Even with them rigged as Alpine's a visual check will show you if it is right. Once you have clipped you will see that the sling still runs through the carabiner. Viola' - easier and safer.

Sorry Nic- and there I thought you were starting to see things the right way...

OS your system doesn't address the equally significant risk of cross loading the biner that's clipped to the gear. You could maybe use double screwgates there but just make sure you have 10 or so left for the stance.

Old Smelly wrote:IEven with them rigged as Alpine's a visual check will show you if it is right. Once you have clipped you will see that the sling still runs through the carabiner. Viola' - easier and safer.

It's NOT easy to see that's my precise point. You can end up in a situation where it LOOKS like it is clipped through the sling when it is in fact clipped around the sling and only held there by the keeper.

I can't find Phlip/Hann's post about this but it is scary just how easy it is to have this happen and not notice it.

Hector knows one or two things about trad. Listen to what he has to say.

For the record I haven't found an extendable draw system for trad that i'm 100% happy with, but I have settled on the 60cm sling with tapped/ rubbered ends for orientation. I like the tape mainly because its the easiest way to ID the bit to not unclip- if any of that makes sense. taking slings off my shoulder is difficult on balancy ground